Ars longa
Vita brevis
Occasio praeceps
Greetings from Russia! And welcome to my newest adventure in blogging. :)
As most of you know, two days ago I embarked on what promises to be one of the grandest adventures of my young life - a 6 month trip around the globe. I hesitate to say that an event of such massive size occurred by accident, but...it seems that it more or less did. What started as a joke one day turned into several jokes, which turned into more jokes, which then became reality. You can only say "We should just take off and travel!" so many times before you actually just take off and travel. Our plans are always subject to change, but at the moment Jon's and my schedule is something like this:
8/20 - 8/24 -- St. Petersburg, Russia
8/24 - 8/27 -- Moscow, Russia
8/27 - 9/1 -- Odessa, Ukraine
9/1 - 10/1 -- Munich, Germany
10/1 - 11/1 -- Budapest, Hungary
11/1 - 12/1 -- Hong Kong
12/1 - 12/8 -- Cairo, Egypt
12/8 - 12/15 -- Tel Aviv, Israel
12/15 - 1/1 -- NYC/CA
1/1 - 2/1 -- Sydney, Australia
2/1 - 3/1 -- Rio, Brazil
8/24 - 8/27 -- Moscow, Russia
8/27 - 9/1 -- Odessa, Ukraine
9/1 - 10/1 -- Munich, Germany
10/1 - 11/1 -- Budapest, Hungary
11/1 - 12/1 -- Hong Kong
12/1 - 12/8 -- Cairo, Egypt
12/8 - 12/15 -- Tel Aviv, Israel
12/15 - 1/1 -- NYC/CA
1/1 - 2/1 -- Sydney, Australia
2/1 - 3/1 -- Rio, Brazil
Having survived a flight on the rather-less-than-auspiciously-named Aeroflot ("Aeroflop: Sometimes we make it"), I am now curled up on the bed of my Saint Petersburg hotel room. Though long, the flight was uneventful. I wasn't sitting next to any fat people, snorers, or children - in fact, I was sitting next to no one at all! By some miracle, karmic blessing, or act of God, no one took the seat next to me, giving me an extra pillow and room to stretch out and sleep for the majority of the 9.5 hour journey.
Upon landing in Moscow, I managed to find a cab that wasn't trying to rip me off and headed to the terminal where my flight to St. Petersburg waited for me. Following more sleep and a surprisingly tasty sandwich, I had arrived at my destination. I walked off the runway to find Jon waiting for me, thankfully not sporting a mustache as he did during his last trip to Russia! He complained that I should never leave for so long again, and we headed to our hotel where I promptly fell asleep and napped until 10pm.
After rousing myself, showering, and tending to the removal of the stitches from my mole excision, we wandered to sushi (or "Суши," my new favorite Cyrillic word!) and then to a club that had been recommended to Jon. The place wasn't packed, but it was surprisingly cool. Vodka is, of course, unbelievably cheap here. Unfortunately, Russians also meticulously measure everything in their drinks, so my vodka and Redbull seemed to err drastically on the side of the Redbull. We spent a while dancing, watching my nails glow under the blacklights, and listening to a man beatboxing on a stage in one of the rooms. I know, I know...a Russian dude beatboxing sounds preposterous. I wouldn't believe it, had I not seen it with my own eyes. He was surprisingly good, actually! His best performance was a rendition of "Satisfaction" by Benny Benassi (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_iBfkBNLi8&feature=PlayList&p=792126F0C7EF4ACA&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=6).
We also explored a karaoke room they had, where Jon sang "Strawberry Fields" at the request of two very drunk Russian girls who decided to befriend us. We split a bottle of champagne with them (A word to the wise: Russians are known for their vodka, not their champagne. It bears a disturbing resemblance to apple juice.) and called it a night. We returned to our hotel just in time to drop by their breakfast - which opens at 8am - before dropping off to sleep.
Today we woke up...well...late. An 8 hour time difference (coming shortly after being somewhere that had an 11 hour time difference!) takes a lot out of you! We spent the afternoon working, journaling, and creating this blog before venturing out for Russia's attempt at Chinese food. The menu included lots of lamb dishes, chicken in cellophane, and that old Chinese favorite - seafood with garlic over vermacelli. After stuffing ourselves and doing a little more work, we hit Metro Club, Jon's favorite nightlife spot in the city.
He has good taste, I must say...the place was huge (three floors, and multiple rooms on each floor), was full of people, and played good music. We danced for quite a while (usually incorporating swing moves into our dancing, which is certainly unheard of in Russia!), becoming covered in the foam that a machine was dropping onto the dancefloor, like snow, in the process. We also spent much of the night discussing how to create a successful business (no really, I swear!), chatting with a bartender that Jon had befriended earlier in the month, and planning our next world tour (a tropical island, Dubai, India, Switzerland, somewhere in Africa where we can go on a safari, Tokyo...it's shaping up to be quite cool!). ;) I even had a bit of absinthe, which was significantly less repulsive than the absinthe I once tried in New York. The presentation was great...the bartender poured the absinthe in a cup, added sugar, then lit it on fire. He covered it with a coaster shortly afterwards so that the flames would extinguish. Then he slowly slid the coaster off the mouth of the glass so that I could inhale the fumes released from it. This was done three times, after which he poured the liquid into a new cup and turned the original glass over on top of a napkin that had a straw poking through it. He explained that I was to do the absinthe as a shot, then suck the last of the remaining vapors from the first glass through the straw.
It was quite the experience. The flavor was strong, but less harsh than the first absinthe I tried, and it left a rather pleasant warm sensation in my chest (since it was still a bit warm from being ignited!). And yes, it was bright green. :) Mostly it made me wish I was sitting in Montmartre in Paris, discussing art and philosophy and literature with a coterie of intellectuals. I dream big, I'm afraid! And I still seem to be stuck in an era that perhaps wasn't meant to be mine... Ah well. I seem to be making the most of the one I was given!!
And now: sleep, in preparation for a visit to the Hermitage Museum tomorrow afternoon.
Спокойной ночи!
PS: Here are a couple of resources that explain how to read cyrillic characters, in case any of you are interested:
http://www.geocities.com/colosseum/track/7635/alphabet.html
http://www.languagehelpers.com/Russian/TheRussianAlphabet.html
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